Media

Media
Manga
Main article: List of Naruto manga volumes
Naruto premiered in Shueisha's Weekly Shōnen Jump magazine in 1999.[13] The first 238 chapters are known as Part I, and constitute the first part of the Naruto storyline. Manga chapters 239 to 244 comprise a gaiden series focusing on the background of the character Kakashi Hatake. All subsequent chapters belong to Part II, which continues the storyline in Part I after a two and a half year time gap. The Naruto manga is serialized in North America by Viz Media in their manga anthology magazine Shonen Jump, with the first chapter of the English adaptation published in the January 2003 issue.[14] To compensate for the gap between the Japanese and English adaptations of the manga, Viz implemented its "Naruto Nation" campaign, where it released three volumes a month in the last four months of 2007 in order to close said gap.[15] Cammie Allen, Viz's product manager, commented that, their main reason for the schedule was to catch up to the Japanese release schedule to give their readers a similar experience to that of Japanese readers.[15] A similar campaign was planned for 2009, with eleven volumes from Part II of the series being released between February and April in order to catch up to the Japanese serialization. Starting with the release of volume forty-five in July, Viz will begin releasing Naruto on a quarterly basis.[16]

As of August 2009[update], 47 tankōbon have been released by Shueisha in Japan, with the first twenty-seven tankōbon containing Part I, and the remaining nineteen belonging to Part II. The first tankōbon was released on March 3, 2000.[17][18] In addition, several tankōbon, each containing ani-manga based one of the Naruto movies, have been released by Shueisha.[19][20][21][22] In Japanese, Shueisha has also released the series for cell-phone download on their website Shueisha Manga Capsule.[23] Viz has released 45 volumes of the English adaptation of the manga with the first being published on August 16, 2003.[24][25] In addition, Viz Media released all twenty-seven volumes in a boxed set, thus constituting the entirety of the Naruto storyline before Part II on November 13, 2007.[26]

Anime series

Anime series
Naruto
Main article: List of Naruto episodes
Directed by Hayato Date and produced by Studio Pierrot and TV Tokyo, the Naruto anime adaptation premiered in Japan on TV Tokyo October 3, 2002, and ran for 220 episodes until its conclusion on February 8, 2007.[27][28] The first 135 episodes are adapted from the first twenty-seven volumes of the manga, while the remaining eighty episodes are original episodes that utilize plot elements not seen in the original manga.[29]

Episodes from the series have been published in DVD. The first DVD series has been the only one to be collected in VHS format.[30] There are a total of five series, with each of the including four episodes per volume.[31] The series has also been collected in a series of three DVD boxes during 2009.[32][33] The newest DVD series is Naruto The Best Scene which collects scenes from the first 135 episodes from the anime.[34]

Viz licensed the anime series for broadcast and distribution in the Region 1 market. The English adaptation of the anime began airing on September 10, 2005 and finished on January 31, 2009, with 209 episodes aired.[35] The episodes have been shown on Cartoon Network's Toonami (United States), YTV's Bionix (Canada) and Jetix's (United Kingdom) programming blocks. YTV still airs the show with newer ones at midnight on Sundays and with reruns at 4am on Tuesdays-Fridays. Beginning on March 28, 2006, Viz released the series on DVD.[36] While the first 26 volumes contain four episodes, since DVD volumes have five episodes.[37] Uncut editions are compiled in DVD Box Sets, each containing 12-15 episodes, with some variation based around story arcs.[38] In the American broadcast, references to alcohol, Japanese culture, sexual innuendo, and the appearance of blood and death were sometimes reduced for the broadcast, but left in the DVD editions.[39] Other networks make additional content edits apart from the edits done by Cartoon Network, such as Jetix's stricter censoring of blood, language, smoking and the like. The series has also been licensed to the websites Hulu, Joost, and Crunchyroll, which air episodes online with the original Japanese audio tracks and English subtitles.[40][41][42]

Naruto: Shippuden

Naruto: Shippuden
Main article: List of Naruto: Shippuden episodes
Naruto: Shippuden (ナルト 疾風伝, Naruto Shippūden?, lit. "Naruto: Hurricane Chronicles") is the ongoing sequel to the original Naruto anime and covers the Naruto manga from volume twenty-eight on. The TV adaptation of Naruto: Shippuden debuted in Japan on February 15, 2007 on TV Tokyo. It is developed by Studio Pierrot and directed by Hayato Date.[29][43] ABS-CBN is the first TV network outside Japan to broadcast Naruto: Shippuden; it aired the first 40 episodes of Naruto: Shippuden, running the show through March 19, 2008. On January 8, 2009, TV Tokyo began broadcasting new episodes via internet streaming directly to monthly subscribers. Each streamed episode is made available online within an hour of its Japanese premiere and includes English subtitles.[44] Viz began streaming English subtitled episodes on January 2, 2009, on its official website for the series. The uploaded episodes include both previously released episodes and the new episodes from Japan.[45] Beginning in October 2009, the English dub of Naruto: Shippuden started airing weekly on Disney XD.[46]

In Late 2009 Disney Channel confirmed Naruto and Naruto Shippuden will come on weekly in March 2010.

The series is being released to Region 2 DVD in Japan with four or five episodes per disc. There are currently four series of DVD releases divided by story arc.[47] There is also a special feature included with the seventh Naruto: Shippuden compilation DVD based on the second ending of the series called Hurricane! "Konoha Academy" Chronicles.[48] Besides the regular DVD series, on December 16, 2009 it will be released one named Kakashi Chronicles: Boys' Life on the Battlefield (カカシ外伝～戦場のボーイズライフ～, Kakashi Gaiden ~Senjō no Bōizu Raifu~?) featuring episodes 119-120 which are set during Kakashi Hatake's childhood.[49] The first North American DVD of the series was released on September 29, 2009.[50]